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Tuesday, December 2, 2008

News Cox shutting down D.C. bureau

Posted by Thomas Wheatley @thomaswheatley on Tue, Dec 2, 2008 at 6:30 PM

Cox Newspapers, a subsidiary of Cox Communications and owner of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, says it will shut down its national and international news bureau in Washington, D.C. on April 1, 2009.

A company memo posted on Romenesko says the AJC and Dayton Daily News will "manage their own Washington and international newsgathering independently following the national bureau's closing through dedicated correspondents in D.C." Eligible employees of the D.C. bureau will be offered "generous" severance packages and continued employment until March 31. Bureau chief Andy Alexander will retire at the end of the year.

"The Washington news bureau and its chief, Andy Alexander, have an impressive and storied history in Washington and in our company," Sandy Schwartz, Cox Newspapers president, said in the memo. "For more than 30 years, the reporters of this bureau have broken an untold number of stories that have had an impact on the lives of our readers in cities and towns all across the U.S. The Cox Washington bureau has won or shared virtually every major American journalism award, including the Pulitzer Prize."

After the jump, read the entire memo. It includes details about Alexander's career — it's been an impressive one — and information about the international bureau.

Cox press release

Cox Newspapers Announces April 2009 Closing of its Washington, D.C. News Bureau

Cox Metro Newspapers to Maintain D.C. Presence

Bureau Chief Andy Alexander to Retire from Cox at Year-End 2008

ATLANTA (December 2, 2008) – Cox Newspapers has announced its plans to close its Washington, D.C.-based national and international news bureau on April 1, 2009. This decision follows Cox's earlier announcement to offer its newspaper operations in Texas, North Carolina and Colorado for sale.

Cox's metro newspapers The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Dayton Daily News will manage their own Washington and international newsgathering independently following the national bureau's closing through dedicated correspondents in D.C. Eligible employees of the bureau will be offered generous severance packages and continued employment through March 31, 2009.

The closing does not impact Cox Television, another subsidiary of Cox Enterprises, which will continue to operate its own Washington broadcasting news bureau.

"The Washington news bureau and its chief, Andy Alexander, have an impressive and storied history in Washington and in our company," said Sandy Schwartz, Cox Newspapers president. "For more than 30 years, the reporters of this bureau have broken an untold number of stories that have had an impact on the lives of our readers in cities and towns all across the U.S. The Cox Washington bureau has won or shared virtually every major American journalism award, including the Pulitzer Prize."

In addition to correspondents in New York and on the West Coast, Cox's international desk currently has reporters deployed in London, Jerusalem, Beijing, Mexico City and the Caribbean. Cox foreign correspondents have literally spanned the globe to provide quality coverage, often at great personal risk. In years past, Cox correspondents traveled undercover with mujahideen rebels fighting Russian forces in Afghanistan to covering the collapse of the Soviet Union from Moscow and the tear-down of the Berlin Wall at the end of the Cold War.

Alexander's award-winning career spans decades of service around the world

Bureau chief Andy Alexander will retire from Cox at year-end 2008. He began his career as a reporter for the Melbourne Herald in Australia, later joining Cox Newspapers' Dayton Journal Herald in January 1971, where he worked as an investigative reporter and political writer.

He came to Cox's Washington, D.C., newspaper bureau in 1976 as the Journal Herald's correspondent, joined the bureau's national staff in 1984 and was named foreign editor in 1989. He subsequently became deputy bureau chief and was named bureau chief in 1997.

During his career, Alexander has reported from more than 50 countries and covered armed conflicts in Vietnam, Angola, Iran and Iraq. He has won or shared in the Raymond Clapper award for distinguished Washington correspondence, the Global Media Award, the Thomas L. Stokes award for environmental reporting, the Ohio Associated Press award for investigative reporting (twice), and the Ohio Associated Press award for feature writing.